


the pull of you

by jacksmannequin



Category: Super Junior
Genre: ...chaos ensues, Alternate Universe, Bickering, Enemies to Lovers, M/M, Romantic Comedy, Workplace AU, american!hyukjae has to move to korea for six months, minor/side changkyu, more tags to come, safe to say he doesnt like the coworker he has to leave with
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:35:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25731466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jacksmannequin/pseuds/jacksmannequin
Summary: Hyukjae hates his job—plain and simple. He hates having to do something he despises every day, hates having to wake up early to do it, hates all of his co-workers. Hates one co-worker.Hyukjae fucking hates Kim Jongwoon.So when the company he works for comes up with a brilliant marketing strategy that forces him to move to a whole different country to work with him, things get a little complicated.
Relationships: Kim Jongwoon | Yesung/Lee Hyukjae | Eunhyuk
Comments: 22
Kudos: 47





	1. in which hyukjae yells at his boss, and kyuhyun is the only one with functioning common sense

Hyukjae knows it’s all about to go to shit the second he leaves for work.

First of all, he has never been late in his life and he sure as hell isn’t about to start now. He slams the door shut behind him and races downstairs, only to find out just as he’s about to reach the hall that he put on mismatched socks. He lets out a frustrated groan and rolls his eyes. It’s not important. Being late isn’t an option—nobody will look down to notice. Hopefully.

Lost in thought, he opens the door and steps outside, already dreading the walk to the subway, until he feels a drop of water land on his nose. Then another one. He looks up, and guess what? It’s raining. And he has mismatched socks on.

He gets to work twenty minutes late. Now, that’s not even that tragic, but to him it is. He might suck at a myriad of things, but being on time isn’t one of them. Frustrated with himself, he makes his way into the building, holding his umbrella with one hand and trying not to make it seem like he’s that desperate to reach the elevator and throw himself into his office. Which he is, though he doesn’t exactly want the receptionist to notice.

She greets him with a smile on her lips. “Good morning.”

He snaps out of his semi-unconscious state and manages to send a smile of his own her way, because she technically didn’t do anything to him, and being a bitch is something he saves for the morons who always leave their trash outside of the trash cans of his apartment complex when the rightful places to leave trash are right there. If his mind uses the word trash again, he’s going to combust.

“Good morning,” he says back, even though he’s itching to get to his desk and disappear under it. The humidity is most definitely not helpful to the tragic state of his mental health. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, everything’s as usual,” she says. “Your supervisor wanted to talk to you, though. He told me to tell you when you came in.”

He frowns, oblivious to what he could want from him. They’re on pretty good terms, or at least they’re as friendly towards each other as you can be with your boss. When he wants to talk to Hyukjae, he shows up at his office and talks to him.

When he realizes she’s still staring at him, he quickly brings his expression back to normal and nods, thanking her for the info. Internally, Hyukjae keeps wondering why he felt the need to tell him through her.

Still confused, he finally makes it into the elevator and runs to push the button to his floor. He relaxes slightly, leaning against the metal surface behind him, and glances at the digital clock above him. The twenty minutes are now twenty-five. Great.

As he stares at the wall and the doors close, someone manages to get in at the last second and sighs in relief when the doors close for good without any of their limbs stuck in it. Hyukjae’s eyes shoot up, and he freezes on the spot when he sees the person in front of him.

“Late, huh?”

He takes a deep breath before acknowledging his presence.

“That’s not your problem, Jongwoon,” he answers eventually, trying not to let him get on his nerves. “You’re here, so you’re late too, aren’t you?”

Kim Jongwoon is arguably the most unlikable man in the whole building, and Hyukjae hates him with a burning passion.

Hyukjae is a calm person. He’s too tired to care about things, mostly. You could say anything to him, and he wouldn’t care whatsoever, so that’s pretty telling as to how fucking annoying Jongwoon is.

Honestly, he can’t even be that resentful towards him, because as much as his whole existence annoys him, he’s pretty much one of their best accountants and he’s unrealistically good at it. Which really irritates him even more, because he’s everything Hyukjae isn’t but wants to be—passionate about his job.

He doesn’t even know why he took Economics in college. It’s not that he’s bad at it, but it’s so boring. He only stuck with it just because, well, it was easy money, really, and it wasn’t even that complicated of a major to him.

He really doesn’t care about his career and only does the bare minimum to get paid, but Jongwoon is so worked up over it, always trying to get to the next level and working late hours, and Hyukjae’s pretty sure that’s why he annoyed Jongwoon in return.

“Probably not, but I’m sure it is yours. What happened to your proverbial punctuality?” he asks, not even trying to mask the teasing in his voice. “I’m not late. I was looking for a file.”

“Okay, and?” Hyukjae asks back, trying not to start screaming at him. It’s taking every fiber of his being not to be rude to him. “Why do you care?”

The actual reason Hyukjae is late is because he slept in. And the reason he slept in is because he was up almost the whole night sweating and suffering because his stomach hurt like hell. And his stomach hurt like hell because he ate leftovers that he didn’t realize were four days old—like a dumbass.

What he isn’t about to do is telling him that. He’d rather let Jongwoon believe he was out partying or having fun, at least he wouldn’t look like a loser.

“I don’t.”

Then shut up, is what he wants to say.

“You shouldn’t,” is what he actually says.

The elevator finally opens to Hyukjae’s floor, which is also Jongwoon’s floor, so they both get out to the hallway with the clear intention to ignore each other. There are a lot of things Hyukjae is thankful for, but most of them all relate to the fact their offices are on opposite sides of the space. Jongwoon walks past him without saying goodbye, luckily, so Hyukjae doesn’t say it either.

Despite all his best intentions, he finds himself glancing back just in time to see Jongwoon disappear around the corner in his usual stuck-up walk. The second he’s not there anymore, Hyukjae looks away and curses himself out. It’s like second nature, because in spite of everything—Jongwoon is hopelessly hot. Especially in suits.

Hyukjae really tries not to notice that every single outfit he wears fits him down to perfection, but he does. He notices constantly, but only because his brain can’t help but making comparisons in any way possible, really. It’s mostly a self-esteem issue, if he has to be honest. Kim Jongwoon could wear anything, while most of the time Hyukjae barely puts clothes on in the morning—which is obvious from the state he’s in.

He looks like he slept in a tie and walked right out.

He shakes his head to distract himself. He still has more pressing problems to deal with than his coworker from hell. He isn’t even that nervous about it. Well, okay, maybe he’s slightly nervous, but not that nervous. His boss had simply never called him to his office in the whole two years he’s been working with him, so—okay, yeah, there might be a chance that he’s fucking nervous.

He takes a deep breath and finally forces himself to knock on his boss’ door, bracing himself for whatever he would find once inside.

“Come in!”

The second he opens the door, whatever anxiety he was feeling quickly dissipates into irritation, because sat in one of the chairs in front of the desk was none other than Kim Jongwoon again.

“I’m just as clueless as you are,” he offers as soon as he notices his presence, then shrugs. “Though I was wondering when you were going to show up.”

Jongwoon doesn’t even look phased by the fact he’s there too, and there he is—his nerves already exposed for the whole building to see. He bites down on his bottom lip to stop himself from saying something snarky and offers a half-hearted greeting to his boss instead—who, to his credit, doesn’t look too pleased either.

“Hyukjae, good morning. Sit down.”

Hyukjae silently takes a seat in front of him, completely ignoring Jongwoon apart from giving him a curt nod of acknowledgement.

“So, now that you’re both here,” his boss starts to say, shifting his gaze back and forth between Hyukjae and the Grinch—Jongwoon. Not the Grinch. “I’ll go straight to the point. Do you guys recall the working abroad program we made everyone sign up for?”

They both nod at the same time.

Hyukjae remembers it very clearly. The company thought it would be a good idea to create this program where employees would have to move for a while to another office, specifically one that wasn’t US-based. Because they thought it would make the associates abroad feel more included.

Personally, Hyukjae thought those associates didn’t give a shit.

A good 99% of the office was head over heels about the idea, because to Hyukjae they’re all workaholics who don’t have significant others, or any other hobbies that don’t include holing themselves up in an office until late night. And, apparently, travelling is the cool thing to do.

Hyukjae doesn’t have a significant other either, but he’s not exactly dying to leave New York and end up in some random country where they don’t know what pizza is. He made sure to specify he would only do it if they sent him to Paris, or to Milan. And if they blackmailed him in the process. Nowhere else.

So yes, it’s easy to say he doesn’t like where this is going.

“Well, the board decided how to go about it and we have the names of who’s getting transferred.”

In that exact moment, he wishes he could say all the blood he once had in his system didn’t disappear, but a quick evaluation of his own mental state confirms it’s exactly what’s happening.

Jongwoon is sitting with his hands in his lap and an intrigued expression in his eyes. His boss is still looking at him with a slightly concerned expression as he talks.

“Everyone has been very happy with our choice. Henry is going to our branch in Toronto and he was over the moon.”

Hyukjae isn’t even listening to him anymore. He’s too busy trying to find an acceptable outcome to this. Maybe they were sending him to Italy. Milan wouldn’t be a bad place to live. He’s sure the food is nice.

His boss scratches his neck as he delivers the final blow.

“You guys have both been assigned to Seoul.”

Hyukjae’s next words end up being more of a choked screech than anything else.

“What?”

Silence falls in the room. Jongwoon doesn’t say a word, which is almost worrying, and their boss looks like he’s waiting it out. Hyukjae is thirty seconds away from combusting.

“Come on, it won’t be that bad.”

“What do you mean it won’t be that bad?” Hyukjae exclaims, and that’s when his professionality gets thrown out of the window. His boss blinks and instinctively shrinks in his chair. Hyukjae has always know he was easy to intimidate, but he’s never had any reason to take advantage of it. Until now. “I don’t want to go to Korea.”

Jongwoon’s watching the whole thing from his chair with an amused smirk. Hyukjae’s so busy going through his crisis that he isn’t even paying him any attention like he would do in any other situation.

He’s going to get out of this.

“Hyukjae, you’re not getting out of this,” his boss shoots back from under his desk.

“There’s no Korea. It’s South Korea. North and South are two different countries,” Hyukjae hears Jongwoon’s voice point out.

“I know that.” Hyukjae turns around to face him. “You shut up.”

“Why me?” He turns back to his boss. “I suck at adapting. I told you I wasn’t going to do it unless it was Italy or France, and that was pushing it too. Can’t you send Irene?”

“Irene is married with kids. I can’t make her go to Asia for six months.”

Which—okay, fair.

“Okay, and what about every single other person in this company? And why—” He looks briefly at Jongwoon, who’s still calmly staring at them both. Hyukjae loathes how collected he always is. “—why with him? We don’t like each other!”

“Agreed,” Jongwoon suddenly perks up.

Hyukjae doesn’t even turn around. “You shut up.”

“Look, I don’t like this either, but it’s a business choice.” He looks exasperated as he talks, which at least fills Hyukjae with a tiny bit of satisfaction. “I know you said Italy or France specifically, but the offices there both needed help in the law department. We had to send someone else.”

He pauses. Hyukjae keeps looking at him with death in his eyes.

“South Korea is a country that’s still very traditional in how they work, and basically everything you do is unconventional. You’re strong willed and stubborn, when you put your mind to it.”

Hyukjae raises an eyebrow. “And I’m Asian.”

“That’s not—” He takes a deep breath and shakes his head as he exhales. “Yes, you’re Asian, but that’s not why you’re the one going.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“That’s why Jongwoon is the one coming with you, actually.”

“Wait,” Jongwoon finally speaks up for the first time in a while. Hyukjae has to hold himself back from huffing. “So I have to babysit him? Because I’m Korean?

“Because you’re one of the best at what you do,” their boss corrects him, looking more and more frustrated as time goes on. “And yes, because you’ve lived and worked there for most of your life. The change won’t be nearly as unsettling as it would be for someone else.”

For reasons he’s not aware of, Hyukjae looks at Jongwoon in surprise. “You were born in Korea?”

Jongwoon raises an eyebrow, and Hyukjae just knows he’s about to be as condescending as he physically can. “Aren’t you Korean, too?”

Hyukjae huffs in annoyance. “I was born in Atlanta.”

“Good for you,” Jongwoon says without missing a beat. “You’re still Korean.”

“Not for the law.”

“So, because he’s ‘American,’ he thinks it’s not weird to be completely detached from Korean culture, and I have to go with him to keep him out of trouble?” Jongwoon asks rhetorically, making air quotes around the word _American_ as if Hyukjae isn’t even there. Hyukjae glares at him. “It doesn’t really sound like a win to me.”

“Yeah, because I can’t wait to have to deal with you every day for half a year.”

“And you think I do?” Jongwoon looks away. Thank God. “Knowing you, you probably don’t even speak the language.”

Hyukjae blinks. Fuck.

“Right!” He finally decides to sit down. Maybe a diplomatic approach will work. His boss takes a seat again. The surreal quality of the whole ordeal still hasn’t hit him. “I don’t speak Korean. How am I supposed to survive?”

His boss, though, looks like he has an answer to every possible qualm. “English is the main language used in the office.”

“I do speak Kor—” Jongwoon starts to say but stops when Hyukjae fixes him with a stare.

“Guess what?”

“What?”

“Shut up.” He looks back in front of him. “Please don’t send me to South Korea. I don’t like sushi.”

“Sushi’s not Kor—” Jongwoon starts again, probably horrified down to his core that Hyukjae would say something so ignorant, but it’s a tactic. He’s not that dumb—he just needs them both to think he is. Hyukjae glarers at him again, and Jongwoon closes his mouth.

“I wish I could do something, but it’s not my call. You’re both leaving next week. You’ll get an email at some point tomorrow with all the details you’ll need, and the flight and everything else have been paid for by the company. You should start planning is my best advice.”

Well. He’s fucked.

* * *

Hyukjae wakes up with the start of a headache. It’s not that out of the ordinary, actually, but it feels more amplified, somehow.

Like he’s missing something.

Like you kind of know there is something you’re not acknowledging, mostly because you’re momentarily putting aside trying to think about it. Because you think it’s not worth it.

And so, he gets up from his bed and goes straight to the bathroom like he always does—then it’s time for breakfast, like every other day. Except it’s not really a normal day, is it, because the calendar on his phone says he’s off work. His alarm didn’t go off, either. Why is that?

He frowns at his phone over cereal. Not that he minds, but vacation days are never random, and pretty damn hard to come by, at that.

Still disoriented, his notifications are his next target. There is only one text, and it’s not that weird, really. His friends are all known for oversleeping, so his mornings are usually void of any phone conversations. That’s probably what happens when you work from home, but Hyukjae wouldn’t know.

Then he looks at it, and it doesn’t help with his confusion one bit.

> **_From: Kyuhyun  
>  _**So I did a quick research in case my memory was failing me and yes, the subway in Seoul looks sorta more confusing than the one in NYC, but you’re not THAT stupid so I don’t know why you’re so worried?? Chill and it’ll be ok

Seoul? Why did he even ask for the subway in Seoul?

Oh.

Great.

“Oh my God, my flight is tomorrow,” he whispers to the void while his soul slowly starts leaving his body.

“I want to die,” is the first thing that leaves his mouth as soon as Kyuhyun picks up.

“Switzerland has assisted suicide,” a sarcasm-heavy voice that definitely doesn’t belong to Kyuhyun answers instead.

“Fuck off, Changmin. It’s not the time. Where’s Kyuhyun? I’m having a breakdown.”

“He’s in the shower, just inhale and exhale and it’ll be fine.”

Hyukjae stares at the cereal slowly turning into a melted mess in his milk while his mind is busy picturing all kinds of deadly scenarios. He’s feeling it. He’s going to die, just like those cereal flakes, only the milk is South Korea.

“I can’t calm down,” he screeches, his braincells working at a hundred miles per hour. “I was having a good fucking time eating my stupid milk and cereal and then it fucking hit me I’m leaving for South Korea in like twenty-four hours for six months, Changmin. Six months. I don’t even know how to put together more than five words.”

“Well,” Changmin says, as calm as ever, and also as annoying as ever. “Look at the bright side. You have a whole fourteen-hour plane journey to ask your dear friend Kim Jongwoon how to say ‘I want to die’ in Korean.”

“You call that the bright side? Being stuck with that asshole in a plane for fourteen hours? When I’m also scared of flying?!”

Once he’s done yelling, Changmin hums his approval. “And Korean sentences.”

“God fucking dammit, I’m gonna pass out.”

“Come on, it won’t be that bad.” He pauses for a moment, like something just dawned on him. “How much do you even know about Korean culture? Your parents would be so embarrassed.”

“That’s a shame they’re not around to see it, then,” Hyukjae snaps, then changes the subject before Changmin can even get another word in. “What’s the music scene over there? I’ll die if I can’t get some decent live music. Are The Novembers Korean? I’ve never checked.”

“They’re from Japan.” Changmin rolls his eyes. Probably. Hyukjae can’t see it, but the annoyance in his voice is enough to tip him off. “It’s pretty good, I guess. Lots of new indie bands recently if you’re not into the idol stuff.”

“Why the fuck does everyone know more about it than me?”

“Because you’ve never stuck your nose outside the US in your whole life even though you definitely have the money to do it, the only states you’ve seen are Georgia, Florida, and New York, and you always reject every single business trip to Europe.”

“I didn’t ask to be attacked like that,” he mutters. The cereal in his milk is so soaked that it won’t take long for it to be disgusting. “Thanks.”

“Just telling the truth—oh, here’s Kyuhyun.” Muffled shuffling follows, and then Changmin’s voice becomes gradually more distant. “Deal with his scared ass, please. He’s exhausting.”

“You’re freaking out, right?”

“I don’t want to go, Kyu,” Hyukjae whispers sadly. “What if I faked being dead?”

“Yeah, because that’s gonna go over _so_ well.”

“What if you shut the fuck up—”

“Yes.” Kyuhyun sighs, the sound backed up by so many other sounds that Hyukjae can’t help but wonder just what the hell Kyuhyun is doing. “Just stay calm, okay? It’s, like, not that big of a deal. It’s only six months.”

“ _Only?_ Only six months. I had tickets for Tame Impala in a month and they’re non-refundable. Also, I don’t like rice.”

“What’s your idea of South Korea, Hyukjae? They have more Starbucks places than we do. You’ll be fine.”

“Is that supposed to make me happy?” Hyukjae blinks at the milk. “I don’t even like coffee.”

Kyuhyun sighs heavily on the other end of the call.

“Hey—”

“You don’t like anything, Hyukjae. This is the tenth time we’ve had this conversation this week. Knock it off and suck it up.”

“Fuck you,” he says, then, “I still haven’t received my ticket in the mail, so until it’s not there, it won’t be real.”

“Go check your damn inbox, Hyukjae,” Kyuhyun snaps. “Of course it’s there. You leave tomorrow.”

“Bye, Kyuhyun. I’m gonna go cry alone since you don’t know how to act. Also, stop calling me by my name every time you finish a sentence, it’s annoying.”

Hyukjae hangs up before Kyuhyun can get another word in, then wordlessly gets up and pours the rest of his soggy cereal down the drain.

This isn’t how he wanted his life to go.

* * *

“Do you really need that?” Kyuhyun asks for the third time, staring right at Hyukjae as he tries to fit a vinyl copy of his favorite The National album into his suitcase. Kyuhyun’s arms are crossed, and his whole stance screams judgment, and maybe if he had to act like this he could’ve just stayed home. “It could break. Airport workers aren’t really graceful, you know.”

“I need something to keep me grounded,” Hyukjae says, frantically moving shirts around to make space for it. “I’ll hang it over my bed. If I’ll have a bed.”

“Why do you act like you’re going to die under a bridge? We’re talking Seoul, not rural Utah.” Kyuhyun starts massaging the bridge of his nose with two fingers, and Hyukjae has never wanted to jump someone more in his entire life. “I wish I could go do my job in South Korea with everything paid for, and you’re here complaining. I haven’t been there in years.”

“You work from home, you can do whatever the hell you want,” Hyukjae says under his breath, trying to calculate how many shirts he would have to give up for a couple more albums. “Book a flight and join me there if you want to come so badly. I’ll change my identity and trick everyone into thinking your name is Lee Hyukjae.”

Kyuhyun pretends to gag. Hyukjae completely ignores him in favor of moving another shirt back to the suitcase.

“That’s not how my job works.” He walks past Hyukjae and lets himself fall down on the bed with a loud thump, which Hyukjae promptly ignores once again. “I’ll never get how I’m supposed to be the pessimist between us. You act like you’ve been sent to a war zone.”

“You like travelling!” Hyukjae exclaims, now finally all out of patience as he growls under his breath. This isn’t going to work. He grabs the vinyl and dumps it back onto his desk with a scowl. “I don’t. I’m scared of planes. I need my routine, my diet, my monthly indie concert, my bed and my movie night.”

“Look, I’m sorry about the flying part, but you’re aware they have grocery stores, music, mattresses and streaming services, aren’t you?”

“It’s not the same thing,” Hyukjae mutters, his back turned to Kyuhyun. He has no idea of what’s going to wait for him on the other side of the planet. It’s like a whole different world, in a place he knows next to nothing about, and with someone he’s not even on good terms with, on top of everything. Is it that hard to have some empathy? “I’m gonna fuck this up. I don’t want to be neighbors with that asshole.”

“Neighbors?” Kyuhyun asks, and Hyukjae finally turns around at the question. “You won’t even live in the same place?”

Hyukjae shakes his head. “Probably in the same apartment complex.”

“I don’t see where the problem is, then.” Kyuhyun sighs, his hands on his thighs, and he kind of looks like an exasperated high school teacher for a second. “Just don’t talk to him?”

“We’ll be in charge of the same team at work,” Hyukjae points out. He could only wish it was that easy. “Same team. We’re gonna be on the same level. In charge. Both of us.”

“You’re both professionals, Hyuk. Even if you think you’re not. You’ll work it out.”

“I’m a professional?” Hyukjae chuckles, though there’s basically no amusement in it. “Great joke.”

“If they want to send you and not someone else, that means you are.” Kyuhyun rolls his eyes, then gestures at Hyukjae to sit down next to him. Hyukjae complies, mostly out of tiredness than anything else. “Do you think they want to fuck shit up in a foreign country?”

“I don’t know,” Hyukjae admits, eventually. His lap looks like the most interesting thing in the world all of a sudden. “I’m kinda panicking.”

“I can see that.”

“It’s not like you’re helping.”

Kyuhyun shrugs. “What are you doing with the apartment?”

“I talked to the landlord already. He’s gonna find someone else to rent it to until I’m back. Or something.”

“See?” Kyuhyun grins, and Hyukjae would like to find the whole situation as funny as his best friend seems to. “You’re organized. You’ll be fine. I’m serious.”

“I’m not fucking organized, I just don’t want to spend money on an apartment I won’t even be in,” Hyukjae says flatly. “Oh, God. How are apartments in Korea?”

Kyuhyun rolls his eyes again. “Like every other apartment in the world?”

“Right.” Hyukjae takes a moment to himself to think about everything he has to do, and when he realizes he just needs to pack the tiny amount of stuff he’s left lying around, he groans. “Fuck, this is happening, isn’t it.”

“Yeah, it is,” Kyuhyun says, calmly, as if he’s talking to a child, but Hyukjae’s too tired to yell at him. “You know, it could be a nice experience.”

“No,” Hyukjae says.

“To reconnect with your roots,” Kyuhyun continues, as if Hyukjae never spoke at all. “Maybe you could finally learn something about it, you know. Now that you’re forced to.”

“Please, don’t,” Hyukjae murmurs, resting his elbows on his thighs and his face on his open palms.

“Why not?” Kyuhyun shrugs. “You can’t run away from it your whole life, Hyukkie.”

“Not my fault no one taught me about it,” he says, unable to stop his voice from gaining back an edge of bitterness he would love to never have to use. “Don’t call me Hyukkie.”

“Okay, Hyukkie,” Kyuhyun nonchalantly says, then reaches out with an arm around Hyukjae’s shoulders. Hyukjae doesn’t say anything—just stares at his knees. “That’s why I said that. There’s your chance.”

Hyukjae doesn’t answer, and Kyuhyun doesn’t add anything else. It feels nice. Kyuhyun’s presence is reassuring, somehow, even if the brat himself never adds anything of value with his words—his touch always does the trick, though. It does help that he’s a giant, and his arms are double in size if compared to Hyukjae’s, so he simply stays there. Kyuhyun just holds him a bit tighter, and Hyukjae lets his arms fall back to his thighs. Leans into his touch.

“Plus, Changmin and I are a videocall away,” Kyuhyun adds after a while, breaking the silence. “In case you decide to take a Korean class and need us to babysit you through it.”

“Shut up,” Hyukjae says, lightly shoving his elbow into Kyuhyun’s stomach. Kyuhyun just laughs, not even pretending to be hurt, because of course that didn’t even phase him. “It can’t be that hard.”

“Annyeong,” Kyuhyun mockingly says, sticking his tongue out at him.

“I know that much, you absolute asshole,” Hyukjae says, making sure he’s making his voice as snarky as possible. Kyuhyun shrugs, and Hyukjae bumps his shoulder into his. “I want to cry. Why Kim Jongwoon of all people?”

“Pretend to get along and it’ll be over before you know it,” Kyuhyun says.

Hyukjae grunts his disappointment once again, then pushes Kyuhyun off him.

“Help me get all the useless stuff out of my suitcase, I was stress packing.”

Kyuhyun throws up a peace sign. “Aye aye, captain.” 

Hyukjae throws a pillow at him instead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so it's now time for me to give my favorite tom and jerry couple a longfic ;_; i've been sitting on this for SO long, and when i say so long i mean really long, so updates should be regular. also, i'm kinda excited about it bc enemies to lovers makes my world go round.
> 
> if you're into that sort of thing, i made a [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/06pCS6zGMHzu5Rbi3O5ImM?si=OT1g_AOQQKernAQciwXgjg) with the songs that inspired this, and if you feel like talking/suffering about yehyuk with me i'm on [twitter](http://twitter.com/homewithkyu) and [curious cat](http://curiouscat.qa/parallelshyuk) <3


	2. in which hyukjae embarrasses himself more than twice, and jongwoon keeps a straight face through all of it

Hyukjae is a person of simple needs. There’s not much he asks from his daily life, and his daily life doesn’t challenge him.

He’s well-adjusted, if you ask him. Sure, sometimes he forgets to flush the toilet. He lives alone, though, so—who cares? And maybe he might forget leftovers in the fridge for more than four days from time to time, and then he gets stomach bugs. It’s not a regular occurrence, so it’s fine.

Sometimes he buys tickets for two shows that are on the same day and only notices it the day of, which promptly triggers an agitated afternoon of trying to decide which one to ditch, and find someone to get rid of the abandoned ticket. Unpredictability is the spice of life, when taken in small doses. He’s always welcoming of one mishap from time to time.

When it comes to punctuality, though? Never. The subway breaks down? He walks. Too many people clogging the street during rush hour? He speed-runs through them, if he has to. He’s the one who waits for people to come to him—not the other way around.

That’s why he’s at the airport one hour before check-in, and Jongwoon is nowhere in sight.

Hyukjae keeps staring at the giant clock on the departures screen with death in his eyes, time passing by so slowly he wouldn’t rule out the chance of his body starting to decompose all of sudden. He has a couple of options, and the only one that wouldn’t make him look like he’s out of his mind involves calling Jongwoon. The other one involves calling Jongwoon and yelling at him. Not the best stunt to pull at six in the morning.

He also doesn’t want to talk to Jongwoon at all, so there’s that.

It’s a shitty morning, all in all, and there’s a possibility he might drop dead in the next couple of minutes from the lack of sleep if something doesn’t distract him soon. He knew he was supposed to go to sleep early, he really did. Someone really needed to explain that to his irrational anxiety, though, and that someone wasn’t going to be him. He’s just going to have to survive on three hours of rest until he manages to close his eyes on the plane. Which he won’t do, because he knows himself and all his issues concerning flying vehicles.

Some girl throws a worried glance his way, and Hyukjae raises an eyebrow at her. She narrows her eyes, yawns, looks away, and walks off. In that order. Hyukjae blinks and stares at her back as she walks away, asking himself why airports always attract all kinds of weirdos.

See, that’s why he doesn’t like travelling.

His phone buzzes in his pocket again. He lets out his heaviest sigh yet and promptly ignores it, already done for the day. Changmin and Kyuhyun have been calling him to pester him ever since he texted them that he was going to the airport, and he’s sick of it. Letting them know was just good friend behaviour. He wasn’t asking for them to wake up for it and really, he was completely okay just knowing they would read it whenever. They have good intentions, deep down—very deep down—and Hyukjae knows it, but out of the two Changmin is certainly the one who doesn’t know how to act like it the most.

Contrary to his belief, calling someone five times in a row just to yell a slightly different variation of ‘Good luck, champ!’ and hang up immediately afterwards every time while you’re arguing with your Uber driver and cursing out your email inbox at the same time isn’t encouragement.

It’s fucking harassment.

His phone starts buzzing again, and Hyukjae keeps ignoring it. He’s starting to get increasingly antsy the more time goes on, and not because he’s excited. If he could run away into the sunset and explode on impact, he would. Right now, to be precise. But no—he’s there, in the middle of JFK, standing half-asleep, waiting for Voldemort to show up and lead him to six months of pure demonic hell, and his work phone is silent. Not a single buzz in sight, in fact.

He grits his teeth when the wrong pocket starts buzzing again.

“You know what,” he murmurs through barely contained anger, shoving his hand towards the source of all evil in this world, “I’m just gonna—”

“Changmin, I swear to God I will fucking cut your throat in half and cook your vocal cords for dinner along with your fucking lungs after I sell your heart on the black market,” he threatens into his phone the second he picks up, though something feels weirdly off.

His personal phone didn’t have that shape the last time he touched it.

“What kind of life do you live outside of work?” Jongwoon’s unbearably bored voice says, and the realization hits Hyukjae like a freezing shower in the middle of winter. “No, actually, don’t answer that. Still, I have to say I’m impressed by your lyrical prowess.”

“Um,” is Hyukjae’s very eloquent and intelligent answer.

“Where are you?” Jongwoon continues just as flatly, not a single ounce of hesitation in his voice.

Hyukjae’s eyes narrow at an undefined spot in front of him, annoyance starting to settle in as it gradually replaces the sudden shock.

“At the airport.”

“No shit, Sherlock,” Jongwoon says, and Hyukjae finds himself frowning instead.

“What do you want to know, then?”

“This place isn’t exactly a small room, but I shouldn’t expect too much given your logical thinking skills,” Jongwoon continues, and Hyukjae can already feel his patience slowly pouring out of him to take a vacation to Calabasas. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Listen up, you f—”

“I’m behind you,” Jongwoon’s voice says both on the phone and in the air around Hyukjae.

Hyukjae almost busts a vein turning around on his feet when he finds himself face to face with Jongwoon’s perfectly collected facial expression.

“Good morning,” Jongwoon continues, as if Hyukjae wasn’t two syllables away from calling him a couple of less than polite names. “You’re on time today?”

“I’m always on time,” Hyukjae answers in a monotone, not really keen to start a riot in the middle of JFK. It’s hard to get back on track after almost letting yourself go, so it’s better to play it safe. He does have to interact with Maleficent for six months, so maybe he should just chill with the name calling. “Just because I’m late once—”

“Yeah, okay,” Jongwoon interrupts him again, a disinterested look on his face, and Hyukjae’s left eye twitches. “When does check-in start?”

“In twenty minutes,” Hyukjae says, unable to hide the annoyance that’s probably written all over his face. Jongwoon doesn’t even seem to notice. “Why are you already here?”

Jongwoon raises an eyebrow, which is more or less the first bit of proof that his face muscles aren’t permanently unusable. “I could ask you the same thing.”

“I don’t like being late.”

“Well, I don’t either,” he says, glancing at the huge screen above them. “The desk number is available.”

Hyukjae follows his eyes to the screen. “Already?”

“They’re probably expecting a lot of people.” Jongwoon shrugs, his face back to a blank slate again. If Hyukjae wasn’t too busy trying not to snap at him, he’d probably find it concerning. “Let’s go.”

“Huh?” Hyukjae blinks at him. “And stand there for half an hour?”

“Twenty minutes.” Jongwoon’s eyes narrow. “Do you have a better idea?”

“Yeah, actually,” Hyukjae says, now the hint of a smirk on his lips. Suddenly, pissing Jongwoon off sounds like the best thing ever. “I skipped breakfast.”

“And that concerns me how, exactly?” Jongwoon says, painfully sarcastic, with what’s probably his least approachable facial expression yet.

It really makes you wonder how anyone could ever find him pleasant to be with. In any sense. Hyukjae could shudder at the mere thought. Just being in his presence seems enough for two lifetimes.

“Aren’t we supposed to be a team?” Hyukjae says, taking his time to make the smile he delivers it with look as disgustingly sweet as possible. “Where you go, I go?”

Jongwoon gives him a long look, as if he’s trying to think of all the ways he could fry him in a pan and serve him for dinner. Hyukjae takes it as his first win of the day. Or the six months, if it’s already time to think that far ahead. He’s still not actually sure he’ll make it to Seoul in one piece.

“No, not really,” he says eventually.

“Loosen up a little, Jongwoon,” Hyukjae exclaims, still smiling obnoxiously. “It won’t hurt you.”

Jongwoon’s eyes narrow at him. “I doubt that.”

“Should I just leave you here?”

“I’m not a child, Hyukjae.”

“Whatever,” Hyukjae lets out, the smile slipping off his face. When it’s fake, it’s tiring to keep it up. He’s going to go get his food, whether Gollum wants anything to do with it or not. “I’m going anyway.”

He turns on his heels and walks off, not even bothering to check whether Jongwoon is following him. His luggage is so heavy it’s hogging all his attention. He couldn’t care less whether he’s being accompanied or not.

“You’re incredibly childish,” Jongwoon’s constantly blank voice says next to him, and it takes a good bit of self-restraint for Hyukjae not to look at the source of it. “Where are you going?”

“To McDonald’s,” Hyukjae shoots back, forcing himself not to feel embarrassed on top of everything else. He’s aware of the way he’s acting, but it’s not his fault, alright? The man next to him is the epitome of everything he hates. He’s allowed to be annoyed. Cut him some slack. “Why are you following me?”

“Because I don’t trust you to get back in time for me not to miss the flight,” Jongwoon continues, sounding clinically bored. Then his voice shifts to slightly hysterical when he adds, “You’re going _where_?”

“You heard me.” He scoffs. “What, is it too low-life of me for your high standards?”

Jongwoon sniffs, and Hyukjae doesn’t need to look to know he’s scrunching up his nose. It sends a jolt of disappointment through his spine—the mere fact he knows him enough to be aware of his usual reactions. That’s what working on the same floor does to you. He hates it, frankly.

“It’s seven in the morning,” he says eventually, disgust so laced with his voice it’s a miracle he’s not having a stronger reaction.

“And?” Hyukjae says nonchalantly, lighting up once he finds what he’s looking for. That yellow logo he loves so much never looked so good. “They have breakfast stuff.”

He happily trots away, ecstatic at the thought of putting food in his stomach. No matter how greasy it might be.

“What are you doing?” Jongwoon says once he catches up to Hyukjae. If Hyukjae didn’t know any better, he’d say he sounds panicked.

“Getting food,” Hyukjae blankly says, his eyes focused on tapping the right thing on the screen. “What does it look like?”

“You’re disgusting,” Jongwoon concludes just as Hyukjae confirms his order of two Big Macs with a satisfied glint in his eyes. “You call that breakfast stuff? You’re so American.”

“That’s what it says on my passport,” Hyukjae says, then adds a medium coke and snatches the receipt. “Like Korea doesn’t have fast food chains.”

“Oh, now you’re an expert on Korea?” Jongwoon follows him up to the counter, an annoyed look plastered on his face. Hyukjae counts it as another win. The day is actually going pretty well all things considered. “We’ll have to wait more because they don’t keep this stuff pre-made in the morning. Hope you’re satisfied.”

“I’m very satisfied,” Hyukjae says.

* * *

“You really fit all that in your body in ten minutes?”

Hyukjae dumps all his hamburger wrappers in the trash, then takes his sweet time finishing the coke that’s left in his cup under Jongwoon’s scrutiny. Jongwoon’s right eye twitches. Hyukjae glances at the ice inside the cup and licks his lips, suppressing the need to dump it on his head. It was funny at first, but the more he has to feel the threatening presence of that piercing stare on his back, the more he feels like punching its owner and running for his life.

Hyukjae is a peaceful person. Violence is never the answer. He’s never hurt a fly, and he doesn’t plan to, but if Jongwoon breathes in his direction one more time that is going to change very soon.

“Yeah.” His lips sealed in a tight smile, he dumps the now empty cup away on top of the burger wrappers and turns back to face him. “I was hungry. Got a problem with that?”

Jongwoon curves an eyebrow. It feels like the wrong thing to focus on, but Hyukjae could swear he uses his signature calculated precision even when he moves the tiniest muscle. He’s never seen anyone twist their face in such an accurate way. It’s scary.

“Don’t you ever watch your language?” he says, not a single twinge of any kind of emotion in his voice. “You’re probably nearing thirty, and yet your word choices make you sound like a teenager.”

“I’m twenty-seven,” Hyukjae says, “and yours make you sound like you shoved a thesaurus up your ass.”

Then, the unimaginable happens. Jongwoon’s lips curl up at one corner. Jongwoon almost _smiles._

Hyukjae’s heart stops for a tiny fraction of a millisecond. “What?”

As if he was caught committing tax fraud, Jongwoon’s face returns to its usual blank slate just as quickly as it changed.

“I’m two years older than you,” he says, then, sounding oddly contrived.

Hyukjae blinks at whatever the hell just happened. “And?”

Jongwoon takes his sweet time completing his thought. It mostly sounded as if he was just thinking out loud more than anything, and Hyukjae can’t do much other than stare back at him with the start of a frown on his face.

“Nothing,” Jongwoon says eventually, his voice back to its regular bored tone as if he’d never said anything at all. He nods at something behind Hyukjae’s back. “It’s time to go.”

“Alright,” Hyukjae says.

It’s not like he’s dying to talk to him. If they do this in silence, maybe it’ll be better for everyone. That resolution lasts for all the time it takes for them to check their luggage in, and then some. Hyukjae can feel himself starting to doze off already, and Jongwoon isn’t doing much to be interesting. Other than being his perfectly composed self, of course.

Now that he’s actually taking a good look at him, it’s strikingly obvious that he’s used to these things, be it travelling or just waking up at ass crack of dawn. Hyukjae would die. Waking up early is a must for being punctual at work, sure, but airports are only cool when they’re out of his sight.

“What?” Jongwoon says, not very kindly, and Hyukjae frowns, caught staring.

A couple of seconds pass before Hyukjae’s brain gets back to Earth to react.

“We gotta go through TSA,” he says, then. “Do you think your ego will make the metal detector go off?”

Jongwoon curves an eyebrow, then scrunches up his nose again and goes back to his phone.

Fine.

Hyukjae wasn’t even the one to start the conversation, so he’s fine with that.

One hundred percent fine. And he’s _not_ falling asleep.

Security is pretty much uneventful, which is surprising, but very welcome. The last time he set foot in an airport to leave for New York, he got stopped by the police in Atlanta for a “random control,” quotation marks and everything. Kyuhyun said it was because he looks like a drug dealer.

Hyukjae doesn’t see it.

Maybe it’s because he’s with Jongwoon, and Jongwoon carries himself as if he’s the second coming of Steve Jobs, but this time no one even blinks twice at him. The start of that very familiar annoyance he’s well acquainted with bubbles up in his throat for a brief moment, but it dies when he realizes he doesn’t care all that much.

Mostly because it doesn’t take long at all before he finds himself strapped in on a way too big plane as reality sets in, and it just so happens that now he has more important things to worry about.

Like not dying.

“Oh, fuck me sideways,” he blurts out under his breath, completely ignoring the lady giving out instructions. He grips the edge of his seat, strongly fearing he’s turning yellow. “With a chainsaw.”

Jongwoon turns around, alerted by Hyukjae’s words, so calmly that it’s almost as if he’s functioning in slow-motion. Or maybe Hyukjae is just losing his mind before anything’s even happened.

“Are you okay?” he whispers, clearly not paying attention to the instructions either. Difference is, Jongwoon and his frequent flyer miles probably can afford it. If the plane crashes, Hyukjae will be the first one without a single clue as to where the life jackets are. For some completely unknown reason, knowing that doesn’t help. “You’re yellow.”

“I suspected,” he whispers with his last breath, his knuckles turning white out of sheer panic.

There’s a moment of silence on Jongwoon’s part, and the distant explanation of the hostess is all Hyukjae’s ears can catch. It doesn’t even sound like English. In his brain, she could be speaking Korean right now and he wouldn’t have a clue.

“Are you going to do anything about it?” Jongwoon asks.

Is he going to do anything about it? Like run to the bathroom and drown himself in the sink before the plane takes off? Sure, sounds like a plan.

“Your lyrical prowess never leaves you,” Jongwoon says, and then, before Hyukjae can ask, “You said it out loud, yes.”

“Oh, fuck me sideways twice,” Hyukjae lets out and slumps against his seat.

“I’m afraid you’re not my type.”

Hyukjae pauses, then blinks, almost comically, before he exhales a, “Did you just make a joke?”

“Is your skin supposed to be gray?” Jongwoon says instead.

“I’m pretty fucking sure not,” Hyukjae snaps, his eyes wide open and firm on the back of the seat in front of him.

Jongwoon nods. “Just checking.”

Just as those two words leave his mouth, the plane starts moving, and Hyukjae loses it.

“I hate my life so much why did I have to be born I should’ve never decided to keep living why did I do that when I could’ve—”

“Hyukjae,” Jongwoon cuts him off, firmer than usual. Which is saying something. Hyukjae’s mouth closes on its own as if out of an instinctive reflex. “By any chance, are you scared of flying?”

The plane gains speed.

Hyukjae gulps.

“Oh, absolutely not, what gave you that idea,” he says all in one breath, completely failing at whatever sarcasm he was going for.

Jongwoon raises an eyebrow. “Oh, you’re not? I was mistaken, then.”

“Do you ever have emotions?” Hyukjae manages to say, driven by the unstoppable force of his annoyance. “Oh, you don’t? I was mistaken, then.”

Jongwoon rolls his eyes, which might have been revolutionary, if only it wasn’t for what he does next. Hyukjae watches him in horror, Jongwoon doesn’t even hesitate for a second, and before he knows it, he’s grabbed Hyukjae’s hand and placed it on the armrest between them. Then he intertwines their fingers, and Hyukjae’s ears go from gray to red.

“Huh,” is the only thing Hyukjae can say before he’s automatically tightening the grip of his fingers on Jongwoon’s. “Okay.”

Jongwoon rolls his eyes again, but before Hyukjae can tell him to go choke on a dick, he starts talking again.

“Don’t get weird ideas,” he says, as if Hyukjae was ever planning on doing that when he can barely think of anything at all. “I just don’t want to deal with you having an anxiety attack on a plane.”

“Fine,” Hyukjae breathes, completely blanking out.

Maybe, just maybe—if he wasn’t currently too busy blinking the panic away, he would be disturbed by the warmth of Jongwoon’s hand on his. Or by how Jongwoon’s is so small that it doesn’t even look like he’s the one doing the holding. More like the other way around. As it stands, it all feels strangely comforting for the most part. Not that he’d ever admit it out loud. Zero chance of that.

Jongwoon has long looked away by the time Hyukjae dares to take a peek at him, and his expression is as stoic as it always is. As if nothing at all is happening, and they’re not holding hands. Hyukjae blinks, actually realizing for the first time that they _are_ holding hands. When he got out of the house determined to do anything to make it out unscathed, he didn’t mean it in a literal sense. More like in a _I’ll tolerate you for the greater good_ sense.

The plane takes off, everything is forgotten, and maybe Hyukjae squeaks.

Under his breath. Very softly.

Jongwoon hears it.

“What if we die?” Hyukjae blurts out before he can stop himself.

He immediately regrets the question when Jongwoon turns around to look at him, his signature arched eyebrow always ready to make Hyukjae lose every tiny bit of the patience he has left.

“Then we die,” he states, like Hyukjae asked the dumbest fucking question ever. “And you avoid Korea.”

“But I’d be dead,” Hyukjae remarks, unhappy with the judgmental tone in his voice. “Doesn’t the possibility, like, scare you or something?”

“Technically, we risk death every day. Are you scared of crossing the road? Why would this be any different?”

Hyukjae exhales a shaky breath, doing his best to focus on Jongwoon’s voice and not on the demonic noise of the plane taking off. Normally, he’d try to do the opposite, but his life stopped being normal a week ago.

“That’s a… good point, actually,” he murmurs against his will, still adamantly avoiding Jongwoon’s stare. Never in his existence was he expecting to say that to Kim Jongwoon. “I’d never thought of it that way.”

“I gathered,” Jongwoon says flatly.

Some of his previous annoyance comes back with a roar just as the plane leaves the ground once and for all, forcing him into a mix of emotions melting with each other inside his brain. Breath gets stuck in his throat, his mouth dry, and Jongwoon, out of everything he could do, just holds his hand tighter. Hyukjae blinks at that, Jongwoon starts rubbing his thumb against the back of his hand almost automatically, and Hyukjae can only stop pretending that it’s not helping.

“Holy shit,” he exhales, his ears clogged and his heartbeat going at two hundred miles per hour. Jongwoon squeezes his hand a bit. “I’m gonna die.”

“You’re not going to die,” Jongwoon shoots back. Maybe Hyukjae’s dreaming it, but his words are softer. Softer than they have ever been when talking to him, at least. Hyukjae closes his eyes. “I travel all the time and I’m still here.”

“I know,” he says, barely managing not to make it sound like a whisper. “You’ve been all over.”

It all feels calmer now, once the whole insufferable-engine-noise-thing has blown over and the plane is going on its merry way, but Hyukjae still can’t bring himself to let his body slacken against his seat. Or let Jongwoon’s hand go.

“Yes,” Jongwoon just says.

There is silence for a moment. Hyukjae’s pretty sure the way he’s holding on to Jongwoon’s hand like a lifeline has been bordering into painful territory for at least a good minute now, but Jongwoon doesn’t object to it.

“How many languages do you even speak?” Hyukjae blurts out without really meaning to. The silence is too much, too deafening in its irony, and he’d be on board with whatever just to fill it and make it disappear. “Like ten? Fifteen?”

“I think you’re giving me too much credit, Hyukjae,” Jongwoon says. Hyukjae’s not really looking, but he’s pretty sure the way his words have become less stoic is also reflected on his face. Maybe he’s so pitiful that even Crudelia DeMon feels bad for him. “Four. Seven if you include the ones I’m bad at.”

Hyukjae’s jaw almost drops, only saved by the need not to look even more stupid than he currently does. He was exaggerating when he said fifteen, but he still wasn’t expecting _seven._

“What.”

“What, you don’t believe me?” Jongwoon says, and Hyukjae would really love to be annoying and nod to that. He really would, but that doesn’t sound out of character in the slightest, and why would Jongwoon even lie about it?

“Just sounds like a lot,” he settles on a compromise in the end.

“Well, you said fifteen.”

“Do you not know what a hyperbole is?” Hyukjae snaps. Now that the plane doesn’t sound like it’s about to crash at all times anymore, it’s easier to slip back into his usual self again. “God.”

“English is my fourth language, so I think I’m allowed,” Jongwoon says calmly. “I do know what it is, though, yes.”

“Stop it,” Hyukjae mutters, glaring at the seat in front of him. “The sarcasm. Don’t make me feel bad about what I say.”

“Okay, monolingual individual.”

Hyukjae instinctively turns around at that, and when their eyes meet, he immediately wishes he hadn’t.

“How do you know I only speak one language?” he asks, setting himself up like an idiot. The urge to slap himself in the face grows stronger.

“Do you?” Jongwoon predictably asks with one eyebrow raised. “Speak more than one?”

Hyukjae’s gaze on him narrows, then he resorts to turning back around before Jongwoon can notice his cheeks getting pinker. As if he doesn’t have enough problems already. Like their hands still being joined. And the fact he doesn’t want the contact to end.

The plane shakes for a split second, and Hyukjae yelps, attracting looks from approximately six people.

“So what languages exactly,” he lets out all in one breath.

Jongwoon sighs. “Try to guess.”

“Where am I? On _Who Wants to Be a Billionaire?”_ Hyukjae croaks out, squeezing Jongwoon’s hand for dear life.

He’s trying _really_ hard not to think of it as Jongwoon’s hand. It’s a hand. He can pretend it’s Kyuhyun’s. Even if Kyuhyun’s hand isn’t this damn small. It’s fine. Everything’s fine.

“I’m trying to distract you, Hyukjae.”

“Odd way to do that, but okay,” Hyukjae says through gritted teeth. “Korean, English.”

“Wow, great deduction skills, Sherlock.”

“Shut up,” Hyukjae mumbles. His life is officially a simulation. “How would I know? French? Why are you making me do this?”

“I told you already, I’m pretty sure.” Jongwoon shifts in his seat, and Hyukjae doesn’t have the courage to look right back at him again. “And yes, French.”

“Huh,” Hyukjae says in the most intelligent way possible. “Why.”

“What do you mean, why?”

Hyukjae gulps. “I don’t know, just sorta seems out of nowhere.”

“My mother lived in France for some years and passed it down to us when I was growing up.”

Hyukjae nods, trying to focus on the information instead of the plane moving. Jongwoon must have at least one sibling, then. There is virtually no reason for him to tell Hyukjae any of this at all, either, but he chalks it up to it being part of his distraction method. It’s working, for the most part, which is even weirder than the entire situation in itself.

“You’re missing four more.”

Hyukjae takes a deep breath. “Should I just list random languages, or what?”

Jongwoon squeezes his hand back, and Hyukjae’s eyes go wide before he can stop himself.

“Be smart about it.”

“You’re not letting this go, are you?”

“Oh, no. I can stop even now. You want the distraction, though, no?”

“You’re so annoying,” Hyukjae murmurs under his breath, not without the necessary snark, but makes no move to let go of Jongwoon’s hand. He’s way beyond the embarrassment phase by now. Nothing’s going to touch him until the plane lands. “Very on brand of you to speak French.”

“It’s also very on brand of you to be American, so I suppose we’re even.”

Hyukjae lets out a sigh. “You speak Japanese.”

“I do, yes. Three to go, I believe in you.”

“Chinese?”

“Yes. I’m really bad at it, but yes.”

Hyukjae blinks, taken aback. “I’m out of guesses.”

“You’re really boring,” Jongwoon says blankly. “You were way more entertaining when you were threatening to rip my vocal cords out.”

“Well, I wasn’t strapped on a death machine yet,” Hyukjae snaps. Then, he finds himself blinking at the void when Jongwoon lets out a chuckle. A proper, entertained _chuckle._ “What?”

“You just reminded me of someone,” Jongwoon says, then reverts back to his usual stoic behavior. “I’m just going to enjoy you being tame until it lasts.”

“When I’m out of here, you’ll see,” Hyukjae forcibly lets out, and maybe there’s a bit of growling under his words. “My wrath and all that comes with—”

“I advise you to close your mouth before you say something you might regret,” Jongwoon cuts him off, leaving Hyukjae’s ears to let out smoke without the mouth to back them up. “Now, back to praising my amazing language skills.”

“Please, stop joking if your voice sounds dead while you do it.”

“Very funny, Hyukjae,” Jongwoon says, clearly not finding it funny. Which is always strangely empowering, by the way. “You should be a comedian.”

“You speak Ukrainian,” Hyukjae says instead, already sensing another bump in the whole flying process. He’s never thought about Ukraine in his life, but there’s a first for everything apparently.

“That’s very random,” is Jongwoon’s comment.

“You said to be random.”

“Yeah.” Jongwoon shrugs. Or at least that’s what it looks like from Hyukjae’s very limited peripheral view. “I do not, but I understand it.”

“You’re not making a lot of sense right now,” Hyukjae says, a bit terrified.

What are the odds Jongwoon is a Slavic agent sent to kill him? Probably slim to none, but you never know what you might have done on the internet to piss off the Russians. Maybe he shouldn’t have downloaded that Lady Gaga album from eMule when he was fourteen. The ads looked unsettling.

“I speak Russian,” Jongwoon says.

Hyukjae nods. “Are you a Russian spy sent to torture me?”

There’s a pause, a bit too long for Jongwoon’s standards, which prompts Hyukjae to look at him in terror. Jongwoon’s face is set in stone, predictably, but his eyes are slightly narrower than they usually are, and maybe Hyukjae shouldn’t have asked that. Great job, dying before you even reached your destination.

He was convinced the plane would knock him out, but it was his co-worker all along. Maybe his boss was in on it. He’ll die without telling Kyuhyun it was him who stole that one vinyl record Changmin had been looking for all over for two whole months. Now they’ll keep looking for it until they die, and the damn thing will never see the light outside Hyukjae’s closet ever again.

Jongwoon’s left eye twitches slightly. “Yes.”

“Ah.” Hyukjae’s eyes grow wider, then he blinks. Jongwoon keeps staring at him with a blank look, and maybe Hyukjae is a dumbass. “That was a joke.”

“Yes,” Jongwoon says.

“Okay.”

“The last one is Italian,” Jongwoon says, his gaze unwavering. “Are you going to ask me if I am a chef next?”

“Probably not,” Hyukjae says, praying to every deity he can think of that he’s not blushing. Oh, heavens. He’ll crawl under a rock and die, for real this time. “Sorry.”

“You’re very weird,” Jongwoon says, a slight frown on his face. For a split second, he looks as if he’s contemplating whether to say something or not. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to deal with it for six whole months, but I’ll try.”

Hyukjae scowls at him. “The feeling is mutual.”

“As it should be,” Jongwoon says, “where would the fun be otherwise?”

Hyukjae doesn’t have an answer to that.

“Your skin looks normal again,” Jongwoon adds, the tone of his voice a bit on the uncomfortable side. “Can I have my hand back?”

“Sure,” Hyukjae mutters, looking away.

Jongwoon lets him go and goes straight to scrolling on his phone.

If it looks like Hyukjae is suffering the sudden lack of skin contact, it’s just because his only distraction is now gone. No other reason.

He takes a deep breath, blinks, and starts looking for his headphones and his white noise playlist.

* * *

“Shut up, Hyukjae.”

Hyukjae rolls his eyes and sits back down on his seat. “I’m just curious.”

“Do I look like Google Translate to you? Shut your mouth already.”

“Or else?”

“Or else I’m going to get off this plane, leave you in the airport, and let you get to your apartment on your own.”

Hyukjae drops it at that. The whole plane ride was fourteen hours of intermittent sleeping, a lot of episodes of some weird Netflix sitcom he didn’t remember downloading on his phone, and a whole lot of feeling bored. All served with moments of pure agonizing terror on the side every time the plane did anything out of the ordinary.

He’s aching all over, hungry for decent food that doesn’t look like it was cooked in a high school canteen, half-asleep, and very, very anxious. If he takes it out by asking Jongwoon how to say curse words in Russian, then he does it and Jongwoon will have to deal with it. Which is what he did.

For a total of ten minutes, before he snapped and threatened to report Hyukjae to HR before their working journey even started.

So, that went well.

There wasn’t much conversation going on apart from that, and Hyukjae’s starting to think the whole language guessing game was a product of his terrified mind. Yes, Jongwoon had been obnoxious through all of it, and yes, once he got bored with it he basically ignored Hyukjae for the entire trip—which can be both good and bad, depending on how Hyukjae is feeling at the moment—but he’d tried to be helpful, at least. Thinking about why Jongwoon would do that for him makes his head hurt, so he simply decided not to for the sake of his already dented sanity.

After all, he has more pressing things to think about at the moment. Like staying alive through the landing process without embarrassing himself again.

“Oh, God,” Hyukjae exhales, pretty sure his face is changing colors again. “Hold my hand again. For a second. Don’t be a dick about it. Please.”

Yeah, exactly like that.

Jongwoon raises an eyebrow, but complies, which Hyukjae wasn’t expecting. The touch feels familiar, for better or for worse, and no matter how hard he tries to come up with excuses, Hyukjae still doesn’t have an explanation for this whole Jongwoon being helpful thing at all.

“It’s fine, Hyukjae.” He starts rubbing circles on the back of Hyukjae’s hand with his thumb, his voice gone softer. At this point, Hyukjae is just going to assume his mind is making that part up. “Brace yourself.”

“Fuck,” Hyukjae whispers, feeling the thud of the plane touching the ground reverberate in all his bones. “Oh, man. I’m still alive.”

“See?” Jongwoon says with a shrug. “Not that big of a deal.”

“Yeah.” Hyukjae glances at their hands. Jongwoon still hasn’t let go of it, and Hyukjae doesn’t move it. “Yeah, I think so.”

As if it’s only just dawned on him that their fingers are still locked, Jongwoon instantly retreats his hand and places it on his lap, away from any kind of contact. Hyukjae doesn’t comment on it, and Jongwoon doesn’t look like he’s phased by it, either.

The people around them start standing up.

“We should go,” Jongwoon speaks up, a slight edge of something to his voice that Hyukjae isn’t sure he has heard yet.

The airport looks painfully unremarkable once they end up with their feet back on solid ground, and granted—Hyukjae doesn’t even know what he was expecting. It’s not that foreign looking, and perhaps that was just Hyukjae’s inexperienced mind talking. People on time, people late, tired people. They’re all running around—or not—just like all people in airports do. The only difference is that everything is in Korean, and Hyukjae starts feeling lost the second his eyes take sight of that.

“I need your passport, your boarding pass, your company insurance, and your American social security number,” Jongwoon lists off on his fingers, getting Hyukjae out of his daydream. He’d forgotten about customs. “Wake up.”

“Why do you have to do it for me?” he says, now slightly irritated for whatever reason. “I’m not a kid.”

“Because I’m the Korean speaker, but I can see you’re barely standing up right now, so let’s drop it.”

Hyukjae nods stiffly, embarrassed at the fact Jongwoon was actually right for once, and complies. That was terrible, and it’ll be great for all parties involved if Jongwoon won’t be right about anything ever again.

He trails behind him with a frown on his face, feeling left out. Whatever Jongwoon was saying, it seemed to be delivered with anything but his usual blank face. Even weirder than that, Jongwoon was wearing a slight, friendly smile on his lips, and—he won’t lie, Hyukjae had no idea his face could do that.

He’s too tired to dwell on that, or anything for that matter—except the fact he’s somewhat sure he looks like a kid next to his rich uncle every time they stand together, much to his own disgust—and Jongwoon deals with everything with the speed of someone who knows what they’re doing. The thought that they won’t get lost as soon as they step outside does its part at calming Hyukjae down, but not by much.

“Are you done staring at me?” Jongwoon asks, waking him up for the second time in a row. “You look like you’re in a coma.”

“I’m tired,” Hyukjae murmurs, genuinely not caring to make it sound anything but pathetic.

It’s true. The sun is almost out, exactly like it was when the plane left in New York, and his jet-lagged brain is currently doing the impossible to stop him from accepting that. The thought he would be getting ready to go out and meet Changmin and Kyuhyun in Manhattan for the night by now, if it wasn’t for whatever this is, passes him by and settles in his consciousness like a crazed bug.

“Yeah, me too, but at least keep it together until we’re done,” he says, gesturing at Hyukjae to follow him.

Hyukjae rolls his eyes at his complete lack of empathy, but sees no reason why he shouldn’t just comply and be done with it.

The parking lot they end up in is terrifying and huge, but somehow Jongwoon marches straight to whatever car he was looking for without a second thought. A man is standing right next to it, probably the driver, and Hyukjae only belatedly realizes that maybe he should act like a human being.

“Hello,” he greets him in Korean, only half-heartedly, because that’s the extent of what he can say. The driver nods, then—bows, pretty much, leaving him to blink at the void. Next thing he knows, that gets him a shove in his ribs.

“Bow back,” Jongwoon whispers through gritted teeth. In his confused state, Hyukjae does, and the man seems to be pleased enough to walk up to him and grab his stuff to put it away in the car. “We’ll have to have a talk about that.”

“I could’ve done that,” Hyukjae protests weakly, earning yet another glare from Jongwoon.

“Why do you always have to put your two cents in? He’s paid to do it. Let him do his job and shut up.”

“Rude,” he whispers, letting out a small sigh.

They get right into the car next, and much to Hyukjae’s own disappointment, Jongwoon climbs into the backseat next to him. Why was he even expecting him to ride shotgun in a situation like this one?

Once the driver pulls out of the parking lot, Hyukjae finds himself glancing outside, only half seeing what’s unfolding before his eyes. Extremely tall buildings follow one another in a rapid succession, blurring out in front of his less than stellar eyesight. So far, it wasn’t _that_ different from New York, after all. The realization helps marginally.

The less he has to change his habits, the better.

“Is this Seoul?” he asks, for no apparent reason.

“This is Incheon,” Jongwoon says calmly, not looking at him. “But we’re going to Seoul, yes.”

“Okay,” Hyukjae says, then, “we’re not living together, are we?”

“God, no,” Jongwoon says, nose scrunched up, and Hyukjae feels a sudden urge to throw hands. “Did you think so?”

“Same apartment complex, isn’t it?” Hyukjae decides to say instead, before the driver has to become a witness in a manslaughter case. “That was what I meant.”

“Ah, yes.” Jongwoon’s face shifts into a concerned frown for a moment. “Mine is the apartment I always use when I come home. Yours might need some adjustments, like changing passwords and the like.”

Home.

Somehow, it hadn’t really clicked that this is home for Jongwoon. The thought is strange, and one that leaves him maybe a little jealous.

Startled by his own thoughts, he shakes his head, and the car stops out of nowhere. Hyukjae isn’t even sure how long it’s been since they left, to be honest.

“What do you mean, passwords?” he asks instead.

Jongwoon doesn’t answer until well after the driver has left with another bow. Jongwoon does the same, urgently elbowing Hyukjae in the side to make him follow his lead with a tight smile.

When Hyukjae looks at him, even that has disappeared.

“Uh, there are no keys? It’s a password combination.”

“Where are we, the Avengers headquarters?”

Jongwoon shakes his head, and he can try to hide it however he pleases, but Hyukjae knows he saw the hint of a smile on his lips. Not that it matters, but it’s not like he’s claiming to make much sense right now.

“Wait,” he adds, before Jongwoon disappears for good. “We don’t have work tomorrow, do we?”

Jongwoon looks at him as if that was enough to be his breaking point, but then just shakes his head.

“It’s Sunday tomorrow, Hyukjae.”

“I don’t know what people here do, not my fault.”

Jongwoon nods, then says, “You’re insane.”

“Exhausted,” Hyukjae corrects him, one foot already over the doorstep.

“And I’m leaving,” Jongwoon concludes. “Good luck.”

Hyukjae frowns for the umpteenth time, but then decides he’s too out of his mind to think about it and leaves the worrying for whenever he’s going to open his eyes again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> turns out it's hard to find time to write when you're in the middle of finals, but here we are, at last :D  
> hope you enjoyed! if you feel like leaving your thoughts on the chapter, comments are appreciated <3 
> 
> otherwise, you can find me over at my newly created [writing account](http://twitter.com/parallelshyuk) on twitter (if you're into sns aus and more yehyuk, [nudge nudge] you might find something you'd like), my [personal twt](http://twitter.com/homewithkyu) and on [curious cat](http://curiouscat.qa/parallelshyuk) if you're shy ! ^^


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